"Extract PDF to Text" Sux

B

bowjest

Registered
I've just spent the last hour trying to get Automator to simply comply with my wish to save the output of "Extract PDF to Text" to a folder of my choosing.

Forget it.

I choose the same output path every time and save the Automator workflow as a service and each time it saves the output to the Desktop.

I close Automator, open the service (User/Library/Services) and sure enough, instead of my path it has Desktop as the output.

I delete the service, reboot the MBP, start all over again, choose my output path, save the service under a name of my choosing, run it, and the output goes to the Desktop, not the folder path I chose.

Surely I'm not the only one who has had this problem.

Is there some cache somewhere that needs to be emptied or something?

I've tried appending a "Move file" action after the "Extract PDF to Text" and it does indeed put a COPY of the file where I choose, but then I have to go back and delete the original version from my Desktop.

Thanks
 
Yes, there is text in the PDF.

I don't have any PDFs that don't have any text in them.

The file output to my Desktop, however is empty, but the file that gets copied/moved to my desired folder has the plain text of the PDF content.
 
bowjest said:
...

The file output to my Desktop, however is empty, but the file that gets copied/moved to my desired folder has the plain text of the PDF content.
Click to expand...
I see. Everything is working as it should. You simply don't know how to set the destination directory for your output.
 
MisterMe said:
I see. Everything is working as it should. You simply don't know how to set the destination directory for your output.
Click to expand...

What an amazing insight! So, you mean when I change the default entry of "Save Output to" from Desktop to my desired folder and save it, this isn't the right way to choose a new destination location?

And to be completely clear:

I click on the default "Save Output to" entry of Desktop in the middle of the workflow "Extract PDF Text", then choose "Other", then navigate to my chosen folder, highlight this, then click Choose at the bottom right of the navigation window and this folder then appears instead of Desktop in the "Save Output to" section of the workflow (I've even tried some of the folders that appear in the list when I click on Desktop - such as my home directory - but regardless, the output always goes to Desktop).

Intriguing. Pray tell, how does one, then, change the output path to where one would like the extracted text to go?

Because when I do the above, log out/restart to make sure everything has been fully refreshed and then navigate to User/Library/Services and double click the service I created, the "Save Output to" is listed as Desktop and not the path I navigated to, highlighted, and then clicked on Choose at the bottom right of the navigation window to select.

And as for the workflow of "Move Finder Items" which I put in (as instructed here:

http://www.macworld.com/article/142601/2009/09/makeaserv

I suppose in Apple-speak "move" doesn't mean "move", but rather "copy and leave an empty file on the Desktop". If so, you're 100% correct.

Otherwise, this isn't working properly.
 
bowjest said:
...

I suppose in Apple-speak "move" doesn't mean "move", but rather "copy and leave an empty file on the Desktop". ...
Click to expand...
I will not develop the Automator action for you, but move means move. The end result of a move is that a file or folder that had been in one folder is now in a different folder. MacOS X limits moves to within a single volume [or drive]. A move between volumes is just a copy.
 
Then I don't see why an empty file is left behind on my desktop.

I have only one drive, one volume. The folder I want the file to go to is in a folder that is on the same level as my Desktop.

I'm not trying to move the file between drives or volumes - simply from one folder (Desktop) to another.

But I would much prefer to just be able to select the folder I want it to go to in the first place and then a move wouldn't be necessary. Would you please address whether the steps I've carried out to do this are correct or not?

You were very quick to assume that I have no idea how to choose the path to the folder I want my text file to end up in, so please do let me know where I've gone wrong here.
 
Bowjest, is the folder you want the output to be placed in under your home directory?

Using a folder called 'pdftext' on the root of my Mac HD it works fine, but under my own /Users/jonathan/ it always gets dumped on the Desktop.
 
calamarain,

I just tried your suggestion and had the same result.

Is that really supposed to be correct behaviour? It won't save to a folder of the user's choosing unless the folder is in the root of the drive?

I can create an alias and drag that to where I would like the files to appear, but seems a bit whacked to me.

Thanks for the suggestion - I'll work on with that, but, wow! Can't see why it's the case.

Cheers,

Bowjest
 
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